Remember the HealthCare.gov launch? It was an info-dense hellstorm of a website that was consistently abandoned by frustrated users. Despite a well-designed, simple wireframe with clearly labeled information and a navigable structure, the deeper people got into the process of finding insurance, the more complicated their experience became.

The highlight of this failure was an overblown security process that took up to 60 minutes to complete, leaving users to scramble for alternatives. Situated Research found that “the early stages of application on HealthCare.gov look simple, and encourage users to begin an application; however, the reality is a long process with difficulties that waste users’ time and a delayed gratification of shopping.

“ The more users you add to a test group, the less you’ll learn.”

Usability testing is the number-one tool for making sure these usability flaws don’t happen. Without proper usability testing, the result for HealthCare.gov led to nationwide difficulty in obtaining insurance through the public marketplace and boatloads of public bashing, but that all could have been easily avoided. Despite popular misconceptions about how cumbersome this process is, you really only need 5 test users per testing group to make sure your product offers a smooth experience.